stopper40 wrote:After watching tonight's game 2 things come to mind, i know I'll catch some flak for this one but I think Leclair has adapted well to his role playing on the 3rd/4th line.

And more importantly, WHY THE F*#@ IS RYAN MALONE EVEN PLAYING? He's giving guys who float or take the a game off from time to time a bad name, he's absolutley useless.

i thought malone had his best game of the year. he looked awesome on the pk

Sorry but I must have missed that. As a top 2 line wing, I was very disappointed in his effort. Ryan, if you read this it's not a hate thing, you need to get moving quick or this team will pass you by.

Henry Hank wrote:LeClair had a strong game. If he keeps playing like that on the checking lines, he's welcome on this team.

Malone had a pretty good game too. He was very good on the PK. He's still a zero even strength. I think soon they may have to think about moving Ouellet up and moving Malone down.

i'm starting to really agree with this. Malone is doing a better job, working the boards and annoying the opponent, which is a 3rd liners job. He doesn't wuite have the offensive touch for the 2nd line, especially with a talent like Malkin, I don't think Malone has enough natural hockey sense to capitalize on Malkin's gives etc...

Watching Crosby, Malkin, Whitney and Gonchar pass the puck around on the PP brings back some great memories of Lemieux, Coffey, Murphy, Francis, Jagr...etc. I LOVE seeing the skill we have out there now. Sometimes I can't believe how lucky we have been. This team is going to be f'n fantastic.

I don't think they can keep Oullet down much more. I think he deserves a spot on the 2nd line. He has great hands. If he plays on the 3rd or 4th line he gets maybe 15 or 20 goals but if he gets time with 87 or 71 who knows? Let him do what he does best. Recchi can probably play a better 2-way game anyways.

Who disagreed with this? At what point is "when you need a goal"? I would consider those times to be powerplay, and last 5 minutes desperation. You do not put them together for even strength of the first period. that's just retarded.

They want to be out there when the game is on the line

IT'S THE FIRST PERIOD.

It is simply an impossibility to even consider benching one of those guys when you NEED THAT GOAL.

IT'S THE FIRST PERIOD. And BENCHING? Yeah, I sure said that we should bench Malkin. Jesus tap dancer.

Wow, you need a drink, relax your overreacting to his comments I think, just my opinion. Don't like what he said, ok, but think a bit before you get your blood pressure up. Sometimes the context is lost, and easily in a game thread.

yeah they are going to play together in the first period too, get used to that too. Even if they add acouple of good wingers they will still put them out there at times at every point in the game. It's called stacking a line and every team has a curveball like that. There isn't a team in the world that does'nt change their lines around. Balance is great but you need to remmebr that the whole object is to WIN THE GAME not be the most balanced line combo. They don't give out points for having balanced lines.

I think people changed their opinions on this after Malkin's first four periods. The general consensus here was to have them centering their own line except in late minuts and pp's. Now the tide is turning however

Personally I think it makes more sense to have them centering one line each. What I want to watch, however, is a completely different matter